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Comment by romanovcode | Hacker News Reader

> Every morning, at 8.30am, an announcement is piped though a speaker in the ceiling of Kim Jong-won’s flat, barking the daily bulletin in a high-pitched voice. The disembodied broadcaster details new parking measures, issues with the pneumatic waste disposal chute and various building maintenance jobs to be carried out that day. “There’s no way of turning it off,” sighs Kim’s wife.

Jesus, this is straight from 1984. Why would someone agree to live in place like that

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> ...“I hate technology but my husband is an early adopter. He has to have everything first.”

Maybe there's no off switch, but the barrier to more drastic measures seems to be social, rather than the death sentence it would have been in 1984. That doesn't mean this is alright, bad and intrusive design causes social problems, but I think it's a mistake to conflate design flaws with intentional coercion.

ok, we're tech people here, how can there be no way to turn it off? I mean, its in your home and can at least be covered, disconnected from a power source etc. In 1984 the issue was that if you did that, they would sooner or later find out and come for you, but I honestly don't believe its so bad in modern SK

Tech nothing - if I couldn't get to the power I'd tape an acoustic tile to the thing and drape the whole mess with a blanket. There's a reason most fire alarms in the US go off when disturbed, and are loud enough to cause hearing damage in an empty room; that's what it takes to fight the inevitable unplugging and silencing attempts aimed at a major safety device.

But the next line is "I hate technology but my husband is an early adopter. He has to have everything first.”, so I'm pretty sure the problem with taking a hammer to the speaker is marital rather than political. This isn't 1984, it's a lesson in how bad design aggravates social friction and personal disagreements.

I mean, there's no way to turn off Windows 10 update either. The motivation is presumably the same in both cases, i.e. to reduce need for tech support

Make the alternatives worse, or remove the alternatives altogether e.g. remove the off switch.

Most tech started removing off switches around 15 years ago anyway.

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